SLB awarded carbon storage contract by UK CCS partnership

Global energy technology company SLB has been awarded a technologies and services contract for carbon storage site development in the North Sea by the Northern Endurance Partnership (NEP), a joint venture between energy businesses BP, Equinor and TotalEnergies.

NEP is developing onshore and offshore infrastructure needed to transport carbon dioxide from carbon capture projects across Teesside and the Humber, collectively known as the East Coast Cluster, to secure storage under the sea.

SLB will deploy its Sequestri carbon storage portfolio – which includes technologies specifically engineered and qualified for the development of carbon storage sites – to construct six carbon storage wells. The project scope includes drilling, measurement, cementing, fluids, completions, wireline and pumping services.

Katherine Rojas, Senior Vice-President of Industrial Decarbonisation at SLB, said, “Technologies and services tailored for carbon storage will play a critical role in shifting the economics and safeguarding the integrity of carbon storage projects.”

The NEP infrastructure is crucial to cutting carbon impacts in the UK’s most carbon intensive industrial regions. Via the Endurance saline aquifer and adjacent stores, it has access to up to 1 billion tonnes of CO₂ storage capacity. The infrastructure will transport and permanently store up to an initial 4 million tonnes of CO₂ per year, with start-up expected in 2028.

Last month, UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced that CCS would receive £9.4bn in capital budgets, allocated as part of the country’s latest spending review. This funding includes support for deployment to fill the initial storage capacity of the East Coast Cluster as well as the HyNet North West cluster.